[Bone marrow transplantation for MDS]

Five patients with myelodysplastic syndrome (RA: 4 cases, RAEB in T: 1 case) were treated with myeloablative immunosuppressive therapy followed by bone marrow transplantation (BMT). Median age was 20-y-o (11-31-y-o). All patients were prepared with cyclophosphamide and total body irradiation. Engraftment was documented in all patients. One patients (case 4, 31-y-o female) died of brain hemorrhage due to the thrombocytopenia refractory to platelet transfusion because of anti-platelet antibody in 34 days after BMT. A patient with RAEB in T was also died of respiratory failure from interstitial pneumonia on Day 173. One patient (case 1, 22-y-o, female) progressively became granulocytopenic and thrombocytopenic status after BMT. She suffered from life-threatening infection and then received a second bone marrow cell infusion from the same donor without any preparative conditioning. These results suggest that BMT could be the treatment of choice for MDS, especially for the patients with RA who have poor prognostic factors including life-threatening cytopenia and or cytogenetical abnormalities.